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The Triibe: 64 current police officers not allowed to testify in Cook County court

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* In 2019, USA Today revealed that the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office did not keep a “Brady list” in accordance with a US Supreme Court ruling that prosecutors must tell anyone accused of a crime about all evidence that may help their defense. Instead, higher-ups merely advised Assistant State’s Attorneys whenever a police officer shouldn’t be allowed to testify…

Reporters for USA TODAY and its partners, including the Chicago-based Invisible Institute, spent more than a year gathering Brady lists from police and prosecutors in thousands of counties to measure compliance with the landmark 1963 ruling in Brady v. Maryland. […]

In Chicago, the Cook County State’s Attorney, the second biggest prosecutor’s office in the country, said it does not keep a Brady list. 

Instead, the office sends individual memos to its prosecutors when it learns a police officer was convicted of a crime or was found by a judge to have lied under oath, telling them to avoid using the cops if possible or to notify defense attorneys. The system leaves individual prosecutors in the sprawling jurisdiction with America’s second-largest police force on their own to track officers with credibility issues.

The result: A USA TODAY analysis found that dozens of officers flagged by judges or convicted of crimes were summoned to testify at trial in recent years, with no assurance the defense was notified.  

The memos are here.

* In March, WGN reported the Cook County State’s Attorney’s do-not-call list was mostly former police officers…

A WGN Investigates review found that the vast majority of those on the list are, in fact, no longer cops. Of the 66 names on the list, only 18 remain certified by the state to be law enforcement officers. Of those, 13 work for the Chicago Police Department. Three of those officers are detectives, according to the CPD.

WGN’s list is here.

* But the Triibe found lots more…

Hundreds of current and former Chicago police officers can never be called to testify by the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office (SAO) because they have histories of misconduct or untruthfulness that would undermine their credibility on the stand, according to documents obtained by The TRiiBE.

The SAO’s so-called Brady and Do Not Call lists, which include names of officers who can’t be relied on in court, are far more extensive than has been previously reported, and include officers who were not included in previous releases by the SAO. One such officer who was not on previously released lists, but is now, is January 6 Capitol rioter Karol Chwiesiuk, who was fired by the Chicago Police Department (CPD) in 2021 and has been charged with five misdemeanors for his part in the attack. Another is Nicholas Jovanovich, who was fired last year for knocking out an activist’s teeth during a 2020 protest in Grant Park.

John Catanzara, the current president of the Fraternal Order of Police, is also listed. Catanzara resigned from CPD in 2021 while facing termination for nearly a dozen rule violations, but was reelected president of the city‘s largest police union earlier this year.

Officers who are still active members of CPD are also on the lists. Marc Jarocki, a 43-year-old officer who is in his 21st year on the force and currently works in the 7th District, is one. He has cost the city more than $200,000 in civil lawsuits and racked up at least 31 civilian complaints, including allegations of excessive force, illegal searches, and false arrests, according to the Invisible Institute’s Civilian Police Data Project. […]

Via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, The TRiiBE obtained the SAO’s most up-to-date Brady and “Do Not Call” lists in April. The lists include 275 names of officers, 200 of whom are or were CPD members. Sixty-four are still employed, meaning they may still be policing out in communities or overseeing active investigations, with annual salaries totaling nearly $7.5 million.

Here’s the full list.

posted by Isabel Miller
Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 11:59 am

Comments

This is a important piece of journalism. The Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office long ignored the requirements of the US Supreme Court’s Brady decision. While it apparently took Kim Foxx too long to build such a list and the list remains incomplete, at least one has finally started.

The Triibe’s article notes that the CPD has failed its responsibility to keep its own list, and to provide the State’s Attorney’s Office with the information. The CPD, the Sheriff’s Office, and suburban departments should all be required by the CCSAO to maintain and turn over lists of officers who are potentially subject to Brady/Giglio.

It’s been 60 years. It’s time for the Cook County criminal justice system to implement Brady.

Comment by Keyrock Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:15 pm
A police officer who cannot testify in court should be assigned to traffic duty or parking enforcement or riding a desk somewhere.

Comment by 47th Ward Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:16 pm
- 47th Ward - Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:16 pm:

They should be fired. A liar is a liar, it doesn’t matter if you’re doing desk duty or waving people through traffic.

Comment by Google Is Your Friend Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:24 pm
“or riding a desk somewhere.”

CPD has to be out of desk space for officers at this rate…You’d think they would have time to solve homicides with all that free time.

Comment by NIU Grad Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:27 pm
44 percent clearance rate on murders. Large number of officers unable to testify in cases because of past history of misconduct. Officers standing around during riots and doing nothing. Can CPD be any more ineffective. Calls to defund the police and divert monies into other strategies are a direct result of this failure. No accounting or auditing procedures seem to be established for effective policing. I would gladly support more cops if they could demonstrate a benchmark they could meet. Johnson has no where to go but up. The city needs a good police force. Maybe he can create one

Comment by Stormsw7706 Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:32 pm
Surely no officer on this list can arrest anyone. It’d be a poor defense if they were sent to jail from one of these court affirmed liars.

Comment by Lurker Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 12:40 pm
===They should be fired.===

I don’t disagree, but take it up with the Police Union, the contract, and the process by which police face discipline. It’s not like that system can be unilaterally amended to allow summary dismissal as much as you might wish for that.

Heck, I’d support making them liable for civil suits too, but again, lots of obstacles to that. Suffice to say, it ain’t a perfect world.

Comment by 47th Ward Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 1:48 pm
Hi - in looking over the report listings, I see that in line 130, Officer Steve Zanoni is listed as having been affiliated with the Park Forest Police Department. As the Village Manager for Park Forest, in my tenure with our community dating back to 1998 I want to correct the record in noting that our Police Department has never had an officer by this name. Perhaps there is an error in confusing Park Forest with Forest Park or any of the many communities in the Chicagoland area that include either Park or Forest in their name. It is respectfully requested that some sort of correction be made. Thank you.

Comment by Thomas Mick Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 2:47 pm
===It is respectfully requested===

Please take this matter up with the Triibe, or the state’s attorney.

Comment by Rich Miller Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 2:48 pm
“or riding a desk somewhere.”

Not to mention that massive sums of tax payer money lost to police misconduct year after year and the amounts wasted on untrustworthy cops who don’t do their job that are still on the force today

Comment by The Office Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 3:11 pm
I’m sure all these names are in the new Giglio/Brady database created by the safe-t act Article 25, eff. 1/1/22.

Comment by ex-ASA Wednesday, May 24, 23 @ 3:47 pm